LatAm OTT and video thrive despite free offers

Revenues from OTT TV episodes and movies for 19 Latin American countries will reach $4.6 billion (€3.91bn) in 2022; up from the $1.87 billion recorded in 2016, according to Digital TV Research.

According to the firm, SVoD will remain the region’s largest OTT revenue source; contributing $2.86 billion by 2022 (62 per cent of the total).

The Latin America OTT TV and Video Forecasts report forecasts 32.54 million SVoD subscribers by 2022; nearly double from the 17.08 million recorded at end-2016. Brazil will account for 34 per cent of the region’s SVoD subs by 2022, with Mexico bringing in a further 28 per cent.

Pan-regional services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Claro Video, Blim, HBO, Crackle and Movistar Play are adding a competitive edge to the SVOD sector.

The top seven regional platforms will account for 88 per cent of the region’s paying SVoD subscribers by end-2022. Netflix will remain the largest pan-regional SVoD platform by some distance, with half of the region’s total by 2022 (down from a 64 per cent share in 2016).

According to Simon Murray, Principal Analyst at Digital TV Research,Claro Video and Movistar Play will have a relatively modest number of paying subscribers. “However, many more people will access these platforms for free as part of their mobile subscriptions. The same is true of HBO Go, where many homes can gain access to the online service for free as part of their pay-TV subscription,” he added.